Free Kindle books & bargains for Friday, February 17, 2017

Promise McNeal is startled awake one night by a jarring dream: she sees a beautiful woman, hanging over a shallow creek, strangled to death with a red scarf. An unsettling image to say the least for a woman who recently left her lucrative job as a psychologist in bustling Atlanta for the mountains of North Carolina, hoping for some peace and quiet.

Promise begins to dig into the mystery surrounding the woman’s murder…until a brand new murder occurs. And Promise’s hoped-for peace and quiet flies right out the window.

Promise has always been a little psychic, and a little embarrassed about it. But here in the mountains, the effect seems magnified. Now making her living as a struggling country-store owner, she has to rely on her psychologist’s knowledge of what makes people tick to make her way through the thicket of intrigue within the family of the dead woman.

By discovering a seed of compassion and nurturing it to effect real change, the dedicated women selected as Harlequin More Than Words award recipients make our world a better place. To celebrate their accomplishments, bestselling authors have honored the winners by writing short stories inspired by their lives and work.

This special eBook is yours at no charge because Harlequin is committed to celebrating women¿s efforts and supporting the causes that are meaningful to them. By sharing Rhonda Clemons’s story, we hope to turn awareness into action and mobilize others to make a difference.

When Heather Shepherd decides to prepare something extra special for her daughter’s birthday, the last thing she needs is another murder on her plate.

That’s exactly what she gets, when the superintendent of one of Hillside’s oldest apartment building’s goes missing. She’s intrigued by the evidence, and horrified that the body and the victim’s dogs, are missing from the crime scene. The lack of witnesses and the missing evidence, make this a case which Heather has to take. She sets off, armed with a box of Birthday Sprinkle Donuts, her bestie Amy’s help, and the desire to finish this before her daughter’s birthday party is due. But this case isn’t simple, and the trail of donut crumbs which should lead them to the killer, have been scattered by the recent bout of rough weather.

Here’s the secret … a hand extended over that invisible line once, exponentially changing the equation. I was convinced we could make our relationship work until Tanner broke the trust he embedded in me from the age of seven.

From bestseller Rachael Herron, comes a book too delightful to put down: Grace is doing just fine–she doesn’t need help, especially from a man whose very nickname is unhealthy. Tox Ellis is the hazmat expert at the Darling Bay Fire Department, and he knows what compounds to keep apart to prevent explosions. Why, then, can’t he seem to stay away from Grace, the woman who seems to think he needs fixing? Is Darling Bay ready for the chemical reaction Grace and Tox generate whenever they’re in the same place at the same time? And who will be standing by to put out the flames?

On his return from South Africa, Charles Knox is invited to spend the weekend at the country home of Sir Neville Strickland, whose beautiful wife Rosamund was once Knox’s fiancée. But in the dead of night Sir Neville is murdered. Who did it? As suspicion falls on each of the house guests in turn, Knox finds himself faced with deception and betrayal on all sides, and only the enigmatic Angela Marchmont seems to offer a solution to the mystery. This 1920s whodunit will delight all fans of traditional country house murder stories.

Six months ago, Nathan’s sister was brutally murdered.
Now the 23-year-old former playboy desires only one thing: revenge.
Late at night, Nathan trudges down the beach where his sister’s body was found. He’s searching for answers, but all he finds is a new nightmare: another girl’s tortured body.
Only this one isn’t dead . . . yet.
The unlikely hero becomes the prime suspect. Saving Caitlin’s life was just the start. Nathan must win her trust and unlock the memories hidden in her nightmares to find out who’s really responsible . . .before it’s too late.

Show me an amateur conjurer, and I’ll stop him before he gets himself killed.

That’s the idea, anyway. But New York City isn’t what it used to be, and I don’t mean the recent crash.

Amateur casters are calling up creatures they shouldn’t be able to. And there’s been a murder at the city’s most hallowed cathedral, a message in blood on the victim’s back the NYPD wants me to interpret, like yesterday.

I’ve been called all these at Central College. One drunken night, one act of irresponsible behavior, and my reputation was ruined. Guys labeled me as easy and girls shied away. To cope, I stayed away from Central social life and away from Central men, so why is it that my new biology lab partner is so irresistible to me?

He’s everything I shouldn’t want. A former Marine involved in illegal fighting with a quick trigger temper and an easy smile for all the women. His fists aren’t the danger to me, though, it’s his charm. He’s sliding his way into my heart and I’m afraid that he’s going to be the one to break me.

For four years, Grace Sullivan wrote to a Marine she never met, and fell in love. But when his deployment ended, so did the letters. Ever since that day, Grace has been coasting, academically and emotionally. The one thing she’s decided? No way is Noah Jackson — or any man — ever going to break her heart again.

Noah has always known exactly what he wants out of life. Success. Stability. Control. That’s why he joined the Marines and that’s why he’s fighting his way — literally — through college. Now that he’s got the rest of his life on track, he has one last conquest: Grace Sullivan. But since he was the one who stopped writing, he knows that winning her back will be his biggest battle yet.

The Alden children—Henry, Jessie, Violet, and Benny—are on their own. Brave and resourceful, they find a rusty, abandoned railroad boxcar in the woods, make it their home, and start a life of adventure.

Since its debut, the Boxcar Children Mysteries has been one of the most beloved and popular children’s collections of all time, and the first of the series was named one of the top 100 children’s novels by School Library Journal. This set includes the first twelve classic stories, following the Alden kids as they get to know their estranged grandfather, face down trouble, solve mysteries, and strengthen an unbreakable bond.

Most of the study of economics deals with commodity markets, where the price of a good connects sellers and buyers. But what about other kinds of “goods,” like a spot in the Yale freshman class or a position at Google? If you’ve ever sought a job or hired someone, applied to college or guided your child into a good kindergarten, asked someone out on a date or been asked out, you’ve participated in a kind of market. This is the territory of matching markets, where “sellers” and “buyers” must choose each other, and price isn’t the only factor determining who gets what.

In Who Gets What—and Why, Nobel laureate Alvin E. Roth reveals the matching markets hidden around us and shows us how to recognize a good match and make smarter, more confident decisions.

Many years of counseling have enabled Dr. Henry Cloud to observe people trying to work out the most important issues of life: relationships, career, fulfillment, meaning, pain, hurt, loss, despair, and addictions. If we sincerely want to “get life right” and quit repeating the same mistakes over and over again, 9 Things You Simply Must Do provides the practical guidance we need to live life to its fullest . . . every moment.

The Basque History of the World is the illuminating story of an ancient and enigmatic people. Signs of their civilization existed well before the arrival of the Romans in 218 B.C., and though theories abound, no one has ever been able to determine their origins. Their ancient tongue, Euskera, is equally mysterious: It is the oldest living European language, and is related to no other language on Earth.

Yet despite their obscure origins and small numbers (2.4 million people today), the Basques have had a profound impact on Europe and the world for more than 2,000 years. Never seeking more land, they have nonetheless fiercely defended their own against invaders ranging from the Celts and Visigoths to Napoleon and Franco.